Up to 40 jobs have been earmarked to be lost at the University of Bedfordshire.

In a statement to staff Vice Chancellor Bill Rammell told staff this week that a range of challenges meant cuts would have to be made.

He said: “We have seen the Government cut our student opportunity budget by £900,000, we face new substantial requirements to fund HE sector bodies previously funded by the Government, we will have to pay the Apprenticeship Levy, we face increased pension and employer National Insurance costs, and our international student numbers have fallen due to UKVI restrictions.”

Announcing the redundancies he said it represented 2.5% of the total staff of 1,250 and would reduce staff/student rations to around 2013 levels.

“This would reduce our staff/student ratios to approximately 2013 levels, and would still represent an increase of 150 staff overall from 2010/11 levels. The vast majority of staff will not be affected by the process” he said.

“As a first step we will be inviting affected staff to apply for voluntary redundancy, moving to compulsory redundancy only as a last resort. We very much hope we can manage this on a voluntary basis. To that end we are offering a substantially enhanced voluntary redundancy package to affected staff.”